Dr. Harry Agbanu
Lecturers in public universities across the country yesterday went to work despite a call for strike by their umbrella body, the University Teachers Association of Ghana (UTAG).
UTAG called for the strike to protest against what it termed as an attack on academic freedom in the country by a law court.
This was after a Winneba High Court had earlier this year instructed the Vice Chancellor of the University of Education Winneba, Prof. Mawutor Avorkeh, to step aside until the determination of a case brought against him and the University Council.
UTAG, which expressed dissatisfaction with the ruling by the court, started a series of actions to register its displeasure, one of which included the strike action.
But lecturers do not seem to be in favour of the strike action, as some of them in universities were seen busily teaching the students yesterday, even in the University of Education, Winneba.
Lectures at the University of Ghana, Legon, University of Cape Coast and Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology were in the halls to teach.
UTAG warned that the strike would be unavoidable if the Winneba logjam continued.
However, the National Executive Committee (NEC) of UTAG, indicated later in the day that it had suspended the strike after consultations.
After a closed-door meeting with Vice Chancellors Ghana (VCG), the National President of UTAG, Dr. Harry Agbanu, said the suspension of the strike was to allow the VCG a two-week period to intervene in the matter.
Speaking to the media, Dr Agbanu said, “They [VCG] have appealed to us to suspend the action, as they take some steps to resolve the issue, so we have also agreed with them that we will suspend our action and give them time to make efforts to resolve the problem.”
“… if there is no success in terms of the restoration of the issue, then we will know the next step to take so when we come out fully. You people will understand that we have done all we could to be able to resolve this issue. So the position is that we are going back to our classrooms from tomorrow [Tuesday], pending the outcome of the steps the VCG wants to take to resolve the issue.”
But Dr. Agbanu said Monday was the first day of the strike and obviously some members probably did not even hear the fact that we were going on strike.”
“Normally, strikes begin this way and gather momentum. So today being the first day, it is expected that those who didn’t know would go to the classroom,” he added.
According to the lecturers, if the stakeholders in the educational sector do not resolve the ongoing legal battle between the top management of the school and one Supi Kofi, they have no other choice than to withdraw their services in protest against an “attack on academic freedom” by external forces.
By Melvin Tarlue